Book of Common Prayer
A Prayer in Sickness[a]
41 Happy are those who are concerned for the poor;
the Lord will help them when they are in trouble.
2 The Lord will protect them and preserve their lives;
he will make them happy in the land;
he will not abandon them to the power of their enemies.
3 The Lord will help them when they are sick
and will restore them to health.
4 I said, “I have sinned against you, Lord;
be merciful to me and heal me.”
5 My enemies say cruel things about me.
They want me to die and be forgotten.
6 Those who come to see me are not sincere;
they gather bad news about me
and then go out and tell it everywhere.
7 All who hate me whisper to each other about me,
they imagine the worst about[b] me.
8 They say, “He is fatally ill;
he will never leave his bed again.”
9 (A)Even my best friend, the one I trusted most,
the one who shared my food,
has turned against me.
10 Be merciful to me, Lord, and restore my health,
and I will pay my enemies back.
11 They will not triumph over me,
and I will know that you are pleased with me.
12 You will help me, because I do what is right;
you will keep me in your presence forever.
13 (B)Praise the Lord, the God of Israel!
Praise him now and forever!
Amen! Amen!
(A)God's Judgment and Grace[a]
52 Why do you boast, great one, of your evil?
God's faithfulness is eternal.
2 You make plans to ruin others;
your tongue is like a sharp razor.
You are always inventing lies.
3 You love evil more than good
and falsehood more than truth.
4 You love to hurt people with your words, you liar!
5 So God will ruin you forever;
he will take hold of you and snatch you from your home;
he will remove you from the world of the living.
6 Righteous people will see this and be afraid;
then they will laugh at you and say,
7 “Look, here is someone who did not depend on God for safety,
but trusted instead in great wealth
and looked for security in being wicked.”
8 But I am like an olive tree growing in the house of God;
I trust in his constant love forever and ever.
9 I will always thank you, God, for what you have done;
in the presence of your people
I will proclaim that you are good.
A Prayer for Protection[a]
44 With our own ears we have heard it, O God—
our ancestors have told us about it,
about the great things you did in their time,
in the days of long ago:
2 how you yourself drove out the heathen
and established your people in their land;
how you punished the other nations
and caused your own to prosper.
3 Your people did not conquer the land with their swords;
they did not win it by their own power;
it was by your power and your strength,
by the assurance of your presence,
which showed that you loved them.
4 You are my king and my God;
you give[b] victory to your people,
5 and by your power we defeat our enemies.
6 I do not trust in my bow
or in my sword to save me;
7 but you have saved us from our enemies
and defeated those who hate us.
8 We will always praise you
and give thanks to you forever.
9 But now you have rejected us and let us be defeated;
you no longer march out with our armies.
10 You made us run from our enemies,
and they took for themselves what was ours.
11 You allowed us to be slaughtered like sheep;
you scattered us in foreign countries.
12 You sold your own people for a small price
as though they had little value.[c]
13 Our neighbors see what you did to us,
and they mock us and laugh at us.
14 You have made us a joke among the nations;
they shake their heads at us in scorn.
15 I am always in disgrace;
I am covered with shame
16 from hearing the sneers and insults
of my enemies and those who hate me.
17 All this has happened to us,
even though we have not forgotten you
or broken the covenant you made with us.
18 We have not been disloyal to you;
we have not disobeyed your commands.
19 Yet you left us helpless among wild animals;
you abandoned us in deepest darkness.
20 If we had stopped worshiping our God
and prayed to a foreign god,
21 you would surely have discovered it,
because you know our secret thoughts.
22 (A)But it is on your account that we are being killed all the time,
that we are treated like sheep to be slaughtered.
23 Wake up, Lord! Why are you asleep?
Rouse yourself Don't reject us forever!
24 Why are you hiding from us?
Don't forget our suffering and trouble!
25 We fall crushed to the ground;
we lie defeated in the dust.
26 Come to our aid!
Because of your constant love save us!
16 (A)Ungodly people have brought death on themselves by the things they have said and done. They yearn for death as if it were a lover. They have gone into partnership with death, and it is just what they deserve.
Wicked Thinking
2 Wicked people are wrong when they say to themselves,
Our life is short and full of sorrow, and when its end comes, there is no escape. No one has ever been known to come back from the world of the dead. 2 We were born by chance, and after life is over, we will be as if we had never been born at all. Our breath is no more than a puff of smoke; our mind is nothing more than a spark thrown off by the beating of our heart. 3 When that spark dies, our body will crumble into ashes, and our breath will become part of the empty air. 4 In time, no one will remember anything we ever did, and even our names will be forgotten. Our lives will pass away like the traces of clouds and vanish like fog in the heat of the sun. 5 Our time on earth is like a passing shadow. There is no escape from the day of our death; it is fixed, and no one can postpone it.
6 (B)The wicked say,
Come on, then, let's enjoy the good things of life, and live in this world the way we did when we were young and free of care! 7 Let's drink the most expensive wines and use the finest perfumes. Let's not miss a single flower in the springtime! 8 Before the roses wither, let's pick them and wear them in our hair! 9 Let's all join in and leave signs everywhere of our carefree revelry! Life owes us that much!
10 We'll oppress the poor, even if they are righteous. We'll show no respect for widows or old people. 11 We'll call ourselves right if we are strong enough to get what we want. No one ever got anywhere by being weak!
21 That is how evil people think, but they are wrong. They are blinded by their own wickedness. 22 They have never known God's secrets, never hoped for the rewards of a holy and blameless life. 23 (A)When God created us, he did not intend for us to die; he made us like himself. 24 It was the Devil's jealousy that brought death into the world, and those who belong to the Devil are the ones who will die.
1 From Paul, who by God's will is an apostle of Christ Jesus, and from our brother Timothy—
2 To God's people in Colossae, who are our faithful friends in union with Christ:
May God our Father give you grace and peace.
Prayer of Thanksgiving
3 We always give thanks to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, when we pray for you. 4 For we have heard of your faith in Christ Jesus and of your love for all God's people. 5 When the true message, the Good News, first came to you, you heard about the hope it offers. So your faith and love are based on what you hope for, which is kept safe for you in heaven. 6 The gospel keeps bringing blessings and is spreading throughout the world, just as it has among you ever since the day you first heard about the grace of God and came to know it as it really is. 7 (A)You learned of God's grace from Epaphras, our dear fellow servant, who is Christ's faithful worker on our[a] behalf. 8 He has told us of the love that the Spirit has given you.
9 For this reason we have always prayed for you, ever since we heard about you. We ask God to fill you with the knowledge of his will, with all the wisdom and understanding that his Spirit gives. 10 Then you will be able to live as the Lord wants and will always do what pleases him. Your lives will produce all kinds of good deeds, and you will grow in your knowledge of God. 11-12 May you be made strong with all the strength which comes from his glorious power, so that you may be able to endure everything with patience. And with joy give thanks to[b] the Father, who has made you fit to have your share of what God has reserved for his people in the kingdom of light. 13 He rescued us from the power of darkness and brought us safe into the kingdom of his dear Son, 14 (B)by whom we are set free, that is, our sins are forgiven.
The Question about the Sabbath(A)
6 (B)Jesus was walking through some wheat fields on a Sabbath. His disciples began to pick the heads of wheat, rub them in their hands, and eat the grain. 2 Some Pharisees asked, “Why are you doing what our Law says you cannot do on the Sabbath?”
3 Jesus answered them, “Haven't you read what David did when he and his men were hungry? 4 (C)He went into the house of God, took the bread offered to God, ate it, and gave it also to his men. Yet it is against our Law for anyone except the priests to eat that bread.”
5 And Jesus concluded, “The Son of Man is Lord of the Sabbath.”
The Man with a Paralyzed Hand(D)
6 On another Sabbath Jesus went into a synagogue and taught. A man was there whose right hand was paralyzed. 7 Some teachers of the Law and some Pharisees wanted a reason to accuse Jesus of doing wrong, so they watched him closely to see if he would heal on the Sabbath. 8 But Jesus knew their thoughts and said to the man, “Stand up and come here to the front.” The man got up and stood there. 9 Then Jesus said to them, “I ask you: What does our Law allow us to do on the Sabbath? To help or to harm? To save someone's life or destroy it?” 10 He looked around at them all; then he said[a] to the man, “Stretch out your hand.” He did so, and his hand became well again.
11 They were filled with rage and began to discuss among themselves what they could do to Jesus.
Good News Translation® (Today’s English Version, Second Edition) © 1992 American Bible Society. All rights reserved. For more information about GNT, visit www.bibles.com and www.gnt.bible.